Wireless communications systems often include a plurality of access points (APs) and/or other network elements in addition to access terminals, e.g., mobile or other end node devices. In many cases access terminals normally communicate with access points via wireless communications links while other elements in the network, e.g., APs, generally communicate with one another via non-air links, e.g., fiber, cable or wire links.
As an Access Terminal (AT) moves in a system, and/or as airlink conditions change, the access terminal may loose or terminate a connection with an AP and may establish and/or maintain a connection with another AP. As a result, an AP which had an airlink connection with an AT may end up in a situation where it has undelivered packets which are to be communicated to an AT with which it no longer has a connection.
APs often subject IP packets and/or other higher level packets to fragmentation prior to transmission over an airlink. RLP (Radio Link Protocol) processing may be used to perform this function and/or to generate header which can be used in reconstructing the higher level packets from, e.g., smaller MAC packets, communicated over an airlink. Different access nodes may implement, e.g., the fragmentation function, slightly differently. Accordingly, in many embodiments, it may important that ATs receiving an RLP packet be able to identify the AP which was responsible for generating the RLP packets to begin with so that the packets can be processed by a corresponding RLP module and the higher level packet, in the case of fragmentation, reconstructed therefrom.
It should be appreciated that there is a need for methods and/or apparatus which support the communications of packets between an AP which is remote to an AT and an AP which is serving the AT and has an active airlink connection with the AT that can be used to deliver packets. There is also a need for methods and/or apparatus which can be used to communicate sufficient control information to allow an AT to apply the proper processing, e.g., RLP processing, to packets received over an airlink.